May 22, 2009

End of the Year Awards

Chosen by their teammates, here are the award winners for the 2009 Chaminade Red Devils...

The Conner Keefe Player of the Year:
JACK MEARA

The Patrick St. Cin Offensive Player of the Year:
ED ROSE

The Jake Entwistle Defensive Player of the Year:
JAKE ENTWISTLE

The Jon Fernandez Most Improved Player:
CHRIS LAUBER

The Jack Benage Hardest Worker Award:
CHRIS WATKINS

The Blake Stabler Rookie of the Year:
JAKE SCHOTT


For reference, the 2008 winners:

The Conner: Michael Kubik
The St. Cin: Michael Kubik
The Jake: Jake Entwistle
The Fern: Chris Duncan
The Jack: Jack Benage
The Blake: Chris Watkins

The permanent plaques are currently being made and will be hung in KB's office.

May 18, 2009

MICDS Pics

On the right side of the page, you will see picutres of our second round game against MICDS. These were taken by Kirkwood coach Reza Benham. As you can tell, he's really good. My favorite is probably Meara in mid-shot, although there are some good ones of Lauber making saves and of the bench watching the game (do all the boys bite their fingernails?). I would like to thank Coach Benham for supplying these pictures free of charge. If you would like a print of any of these pictures, please go to http://shariphotos.com.

May 15, 2009

Sea of Red Tonight

Tonight at 6:30pm at the St. Peter's Rec-Plex, the Red Devils take on #1 ranked SLUH in the semi-finals of the state tournament. I would like all Chaminde supporters to wear as much RED clothing as they can put on their body. SLUH will likely bring a horde of students painted blue, so we need to counter that with our own Sea of Red.

See you tonight.

May 13, 2009

Chaminade 8 - MICDS 6

The back of senior captain Jack Meara is quite strong, as he carried his entire team to victory tonight. 6 goals in all, including his first backhand of the year, with 3 coming in the first quarter as the Red Devils jumped out to an early lead against MICDS and didn't look back.

The game plan was to minimize first team all-conference player Parker Condie and make his teammates beat us. For most of the game, we played a drop defense which worked very well by preventing Parker from getting the ball in front of the goal. Although there were some breakdowns when the Rams drove through, for the most part, the MICDS offense was held at bay. Kudos to everyone who touched the water tonight for playing solid team defense.

The two major breakdowns came in ejections and in communication. Four kickouts matches our season high and MICDS capitalized on three of them. Communication, especially LOUD communication, is something we have struggled with all year. Otherwise, we played about as good a game as we could, aggressive offensively and sound defensively.

The Red Devils came to play tonight and the hard work all year paid off when they needed it to. We stuck together, never got down on ourselves when the Rams made a late comeback, and we held on for the program's 5th final four in 6 years. As I was quoted as saying last year: from this point on it's all gravy, so we should just have fun with the rest of the season. All year long, I believe we are the team best equipped to play with SLUH and Friday night is our chance to prove it.

Goals: Meara - 6, Entwistle - 1, Glauber - 1
Assists: Glauber - 2, Watkins - 2, Duncan - 1, Rose - 1, Schott - 1
Steals: Entwistle - 3, Meara - 3, Duncan - 2, Lauber - 1, Rose - 1, Schott - 1, Watkins - 1
Kickouts: Entwistle - 1, Meara - 1, Rose - 1, Watkins - 1
Saves: Lauber - 11

POTG: Meara

Up Next: Final Four on Friday night.

May 12, 2009

Quick Notes

The Missouri Water Polo Banquet is Saturday May 30th. It will be precluded by the Senior All-Star Game and Skill Competition. This will be the first ever Skills Competition and it will include jump balls, swim-offs and hardest shot. After the game, there will be dinner and a banquet where the All-District teams and the "Of The Year" awards are announced. The registration form for the banquet is linked from the home page of http://mowaterpolo.com.

Kirkwood's coach, Rez Benham, is also a great photographer and he has taken some photos of our games this year and last year. He will be at the pool on Wednesday for our game against MICDS as well. I know Mr. Duncan has been taking photos throughout the year, but Rez might have some shots worth taking a look at. His website is http://www.shariphotos.com.

See you tomorrow night!

May 7, 2009

Entwistle Nominated for DPOTY

Chaminade’s senior Jake Entwistle was named as a finalist for Defensive Player of the Year. The voting was done this week and the top three nominees in each category were announced. The winners, along with the All-Distict teams, will be announced at the Missouri Water Polo Banquet on Saturday, May 30th at MICDS. The Banquet will be precluded by the Senior All-Star Game and Skills Competition. To attend, please go to http://mowaterpolo.com and on the front page you will see a link to the registration form. I hope you can make it out to watch the game and support Jake in his nomination.

The other finalists (in alphabetical order):
Coach of the Year: Paul Baudendistel, Rich Davison, Gerard Gonthier
Offensive Player of the Year: Parker Finlinson, John Heafner, Matt Stipanovich
Defensive Player of the Year: Matt Baumgartner, Jake Entwistle, Michael O’Neill
Female Player of the Year: Grace Kenyon, Demi Nichoalds, Taylor Rackovan
Player of the Year: William Page, Kyle Schnoring, Matt Stipanovich

May 5, 2009

All-Conference Teams Named

The All-Conference selections were announced today. Out of respect for the players on other teams (they should hear it from their coach), I will only mention our boys:

First Team: Jack Meara
Second Team: Jake Entwistle, Ed Rose

Congratulations guys! All three of you are very deserving of the honor. All-District voting began yesterday and the results won't be announced until the Missouri Water Polo Banquet on May 30th.